


Blast From The Past

by mountain_born



Series: The Marvelous Tale of an Agent, an Archer, and an Assassin [45]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, Doctor Who/Avengers Crossover Fusion, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 08:09:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13026843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mountain_born/pseuds/mountain_born
Summary: Fifteen years ago, Clint Barton’s brother walked out of his life.  Now, thanks to the Battle of New York, he’s about to walk back in again.





	Blast From The Past

**Author's Note:**

> A bit round of applause to my awesome beta, **like-a-raven** who beta-ed this story not once, but twice in the midst of crazy holiday prep, work insanity, a gala, and an epic bake-a-thon!
> 
> I debated for a long time about whether or not Barney Barton would appear in this ‘verse. Then, once I’d decided to go for it, I debated for a long time about how to do it. What might Barney have been up to all this time? How would this reunion happen? I’m not at all well-versed in comic canon, but my brief research seemed to indicate that Barney was often portrayed as an anti-hero at best, or a villain at worst.
> 
> Ultimately, I decided to go for a different angle. I hope you enjoy it. This is a bit of a "bridge" story--some fluff, some charactery goodness, some setting up of stories to come. Happy reading, and a safe and happy holiday season to everyone!

_Six Months Ago_  
_April 2012_  
_Two Days After the Battle of New York_  
_Hartnell, Indiana_

The nights were quiet in Hartnell, Indiana.

Hartnell was a quiet sort of place in general, the kind of small, friendly Midwestern town that Barney Barton once swore he’d never settle down in. That had been many years, a prison stint, and a second chance ago, though. Barney liked to think that his head was screwed on a lot better nowadays. 

It had been hours since he’d heard so much as a car pass by on the street. The bedroom windows were cracked slightly open. No worries about crime or danger here. They were a long way from Indianapolis. 

They were a hell of a long way from New York City.

Lisa was sound asleep beside him, taking advantage of the fact that the infant in the bassinette at the foot of their bed was also sleeping for the moment. _Always try to sleep when the baby sleeps,_ his wife liked to say. Barney was perfectly willing to take her word for it. After all, this was Lisa’s third go-around with a new baby as opposed to Barney’s first. Barney didn’t know if it was some sort of phase or what, but little Caleb had been up every couple of hours the last few nights.

Barney knew he should be sleeping, too. He had work in the morning, but for some reason he couldn’t settle. Barney carefully slid out of bed and headed for the kitchen. He stopped to check on the girls on his way. Zoe’s bed was empty. A quick check of the room next door confirmed that she’d crawled in with Maddie again tonight. Zoe was freaked out by what had happened in New York, convinced that the aliens were going to invade Hartnell next. Barney and Lisa had been trying to limit the amount of news she saw and heard, but it wasn’t easy. New York was all anyone was talking about. 

By the time Barney had downed a glass of water and gone back to his room, Caleb had woken up and started to fuss. “No, no, no. Don’t wake your mom.” Barney scooped the baby up and headed back to the kitchen for a bottle. He settled down on the sofa with the baby and flipped the television on, turning the volume down low.

The one thing that _had_ made Zoe feel safer was hearing the stories about the Avengers. Actual honest-to-God superheroes had saved the planet. It was crazy, Barney thought. You’d have to live under a rock not to know about Tony Stark’s Iron Man of course, but the other five had come out of nowhere, and the media was scrambling to find information about them. They were having a bit of luck with Captain America (the original one, apparently). The media had been throwing around the phrase "cryogenic suspension" when they talked about him. Thor was getting a lot of coverage, too. Barney thought that might be because it was hard to miss a guy wearing that outfit. Also, according to the academics, Thor’s very existence was going to _rewrite human history as we know it._

The other three were a bit more shadowy. A green giant should be hard to hide, but some witnesses were saying that they had seen the Hulk shrink back down to a regular guy after the battle. Barney wondered if there was any truth to the story that the Hulk had gone on a rampage in Harlem a year or so ago. Barney vaguely remembered the news coverage of that event. At the time it had been chalked up to gas explosions.

That left the two mystery agents of SHIELD, who no one seemed to know a damn thing about. The newscasters were talking about them in the segment Barney had just tuned in to. Barney half listened to the television while watching his son sleepily suck down his bottle.

“SHIELD has issued an official statement confirming that these two individuals are indeed agents in their employ. It has also confirmed that they are part of the Avengers, the team being touted as the _Heroes of New York._ SHIELD is not releasing their names, but has disclosed that they are known within the organization as _Talon_ and _Hawkeye_.”

An involuntary reflex made Barney glance up at the word _Hawkeye._ What he saw on the television screen made him sit straight up on the sofa.

It was footage of the battle, but this was a clip Barney hadn’t seen before. It was shaky and looked like it had been shot with a phone. It showed a man and a woman in black uniforms firing on the aliens from behind a makeshift barricade in the middle of the street. Whoever had filmed it hadn’t been close enough or calm enough to get a good shot of their faces, but one detail was very clear: the man was armed with a bow and arrows. 

And Barney would recognize that stance anywhere.

The clip was short, only a few seconds long, then the channel cut back to the news anchors. Caleb started to wail—Barney had been so distracted he’d let the nipple fall out of the baby’s mouth. Barney got Caleb shushed and finished feeding him. Once the baby had snuggled into Barney’s chest and started drifting off again, Barney relocated to the computer desk in the corner and started typing one-handed.

It didn’t take long to find the clip online. Each time he played it, Barney became more and more convinced of what he had seen. After all, how many times had he watched the Amazing Hawkeye under the big top of Carson’s Carnival?

Barney tiptoed back to the bedroom and carefully laid Caleb in his bassinette. Then—after taking a brief moment to consider the short-term consequences on his largely harmonious marriage—he sat down on the edge of the bed and shook Lisa by the shoulder.

“Lisa? Lisa, wake up.”

“Mphf?” Lisa blinked up at him for a second, then quickly snapped into “awake” mode. “Barney?” She sat up. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“I know this is going to sound completely crazy,” Barney said, “but I think I just found Clint.”

*****

_Six months later. . ._  
 _October 2012_  
 _Somewhere Between Washington DC and New York City_

Phil let the sway of the train lull him for the first hour out of DC.

It had been a rough weekend. Ordinarily an impromptu trip down to Arlington to visit Valerie was fun and relaxing, but this trip had been for a specific and sad reason. Jackson was gone. Valerie’s dog had been getting on in years, and two weeks ago his health had taken a sudden, severe, and irreversible downturn. The vet had advised that the kindest thing to do was to let him go peacefully.

Phil had gone down for moral support. Jackson had made his last trip to the vet on Saturday wearing the SHIELD bandana that Clint and River had sent. Valerie had been kind of a mess—a quietly composed mess, but a mess. Phil hadn’t been much better. He’d given Jackson to Valerie as a puppy ten years ago. Jackson had been through a lot with the two of them.

They’d spent the remainder of the weekend curled up on the sofa distracting themselves with old movies and episodes of Valerie’s favorite cooking competition shows. Phil wished he could have stayed a few days longer, but his workload wasn’t getting any lighter these days. 

Once the train was north of Philadelphia, he unfolded the desk in this small compartment, opened his briefcase, and pulled out the handful of files he’d brought with him. He’d almost finished working through the backlog that had built up during the weeks when he’d been in the hospital and in rehab. (Maria Hill had looked like a woman newly freed from the Bastille when she’d shifted that stack of work to his desk upon his return.) Phil was down to the low-priority stuff now, the perfect thing to knock out on a train ride. 

He breezed through the first three files. Phil started to feel a little more centered, the way he always did when he was able to square things away. Then he opened the fourth file, and a familiar name at the top of the cover sheet smacked him out of his short-lived complacency.

_Barton, Charles Bernard “Barney”_

“What the hell?”

Phil scanned the file quickly. Mostly it was a log of phone calls. Barney Barton had been repeatedly calling every SHIELD number he could find since April. The content of the calls was all largely the same. 

_I know I saw my brother in news footage from New York. They said he’s an agent with your organization. His name is Clint Barton. Please, I just want to talk to him._

SHIELD was supposed to have killed any footage from the Battle of New York that showed Clint and River, but they could only do so much, and they had only been able to do it so fast. Phil knew that some images had gotten out.

Barney hadn’t gotten anywhere, obviously. The SHIELD numbers he’d been able to find were for general switchboards. Even if the employees manning them had known the name “Clint Barton,” they’d never confirm or deny that to a random caller. They’d done exactly what they were supposed to do; they had obfuscated, given Barney the run around, and kicked the problem up the food chain. 

Phil pulled out his phone and called Hill. 

“Just explain to me how this situation got flagged as low priority,” Phil said once they’d gotten the niceties out of the way.

“It was flagged as low priority because it’s low priority.” Phil could hear Hill typing in the background. “We had bigger fish to fry than an ex-con electrician from the Midwest. He’s not a threat no matter how many phone calls he makes and, last I heard, Barton and his brother were estranged.”

Hill wasn’t wrong about that. Phil had started a file on Barney Barton when Clint had first been recruited. It was standard background screening on agents who were on the career path Clint had been hired for. But beyond providing a few terse bits of information, Clint had made it clear that he didn’t want to discuss his brother. He didn’t know where Barney was and he didn’t care. 

Phil hadn’t pushed it. Clint had been nineteen then, all piss and vinegar with trust issues pronounced enough to raise some concerned eyebrows in the Psych Department. Phil had tracked Barney down on his own and continued to keep tabs on him. He thought that eventually a day might come when Clint _would_ want to know what had become of his brother, and when that happened Phil would have the information ready to give to him.

So far, they were at thirteen years and counting. After Clint had started trusting Phil and opening up more, he’d talk about Barney occasionally. But even though he knew that Phil had investigated Barney, Clint had never asked Phil to share what he knew. Now thanks to the Battle of New York, Barney Barton had the potential to become a big problem. If he was anything like his little brother, he would be like a dog with a bone. He wasn’t just going to give up and go away.

“Are you going to tell him?” Hill asked.

“I don’t know.” Phil’s first instinct was to protect Clint, which meant _hell no._ But he honestly wasn’t sure what the right play was here. “What’s the current situation? This file hasn’t been updated since August.”

“I’m pulling the updates now. I put the Indianapolis field office on it. They’re keeping an eye on him. Looks like more calls, three or four a week. His daily routine hasn’t altered; he’s still going to work, going to stuff at his kids’ schools. They have a note here on his internet activity. . .oh.”

“Oh? What oh?” 

“He’s been researching journalists at the Washington Post,” Hill said.

 _Shit. Shit, shit, shit._ “Do you think he’s going to try to go public?”

“That would be one way of getting SHIELD’s attention,” Hill replied. “ _Long Lost Brother of Semi-Anonymous Avenger Comes Forward._ Assuming he could get anyone to believe him.”

“Damn it.” And it could completely compromise Clint’s identity. Phil doubted that that was Barney’s intention, but his ploy could do a hell of a lot of damage. “Hey, could you do me a favor? My train’s getting into New York at noon. Could you have a quinjet meet me out at LaGuardia?”

“You’re going to Indiana?”

“Yeah. I want to get my own read on the situation.”

And then he’d figure out what the hell to do about it.

*****

_The Same Day_  
 _Hartnell, Indiana_

The first thing Barney saw upon leaving work was that the Fed-mobile was back, parked across the street from Yastrzmski & Sons, Electricians. A slick, dark car had started turning up a couple of times a week not long after he’d started making calls to SHIELD. Sometimes it was outside the office. Sometimes it was parked down the block from the house. Barney had even seen it outside of a job site once or twice. One of the perks of living in a small town: an out-of-place vehicle wasn’t too hard to spot.

Lisa had not been amused. She’d even called the cops about it at one point, but there hadn’t been much that the Hartnell Police could do about a couple of people just sitting in a car, especially when they had badges of their own. 

Barney had actually taken it as a good sign. If SHIELD was keeping an eye on him, it had to mean that he was on the right track. Clint was inside that organization somewhere.

He slowed his pace as he walked to his truck. There had never been any interaction with the people in those cars, not once. But today the car door opened and a man got out. He was just an ordinary-looking guy in a suit and sunglasses. He glanced up and down the street, then headed straight for Barney.

“Mr. Barton?”

Barney stopped in the middle of the parking lot. “Yeah?”

The man removed his sunglasses. “My name is Agent Phillip Coulson. I’m with SHIELD.”

From a distance Agent Phillip Coulson had looked like a middle-management accountant. Up close. . .well, Barney suddenly felt very glad that his boss, Patty, and some of the guys were still in the building and that what amounted to rush-hour traffic in Hartnell was going by on the street. There was something about the man that came across as a little bit dangerous. That said, Barney didn’t think he’d try anything in a public parking lot.

“I was wondering when you guys were actually going to introduce yourselves,” Barney said, mustering up a little bit of the attitude that had gotten him through his prison stint.

“It seemed like time,” Agent Coulson replied. “Since you’ve been so persistent about contacting us. You’ve created something of a conundrum for my office.”

“I’m just trying to reach my brother,” Barney replied.

“So the phone logs have noted,” Agent Coulson said. “Why?” 

The blunt question brought Barney up short for a second. “Why?”

“Why?” Agent Coulson repeated. “Why do you want to contact your brother?”

Were these SHIELD people for real? It was kind of hard to tell. On the other hand, they were talking to him now instead of just following him around. Barney didn’t want to set fire to a bridge he’d just stepped on, so he watched his manners.

“He’s my brother, and I haven’t seen him for a long time,” Barney said. “I didn’t know where he was or how to find him. Now I do. I just. . .” How did you sum up over a decade of regret and not-knowing to a guy wearing _that_ suit? “I want to know that he’s okay.”

“I see.” Agent Coulson raised a cool eyebrow. “You weren’t all that concerned with whether or not he was okay when you walked out on him fifteen years ago. You didn’t even leave a note.”

Barney bristled defensively.

“Look, I’m not trying to make excuses for myself. I was twenty-one. I was a mess and I made some really stupid decisions. But that was--” _Wait a minute._ Barney narrowed his eyes. “You know him, don’t you? You know Clint.”

This Agent Coulson wasn’t just some random suit sent by SHIELD to take care of the squeaky wheel. How else would he know that thing about the note, or lack of it? Why else would he seem to be taking this personally?

“I’m aware that you got your life straightened out, Mr. Barton,” Agent Coulson said, side-stepping the question. “What you’ve made of yourself is commendable; you have a home, a family, a good job. You’re an upstanding citizen.” The man’s eyes hardened. “Believe me when I say that I have the ability to make your life incredibly difficult, and if you do anything to compromise the identity of my agent I will exercise that ability to the fullest. I know you’re planning on going to the press.”

“How do you--” Barney shook his head. “You know, I probably don’t want to know. Yeah, I reached out. Every other avenue I tried seemed like a dead end. I thought that, at least, would get your attention. And it looks like I wasn’t wrong.”

Frankly, Barney would be perfectly happy not going to the press if there was another option. He was not a center-of-attention sort of guy. 

Agent Coulson actually cracked a very, very slight smile.

“No, you weren’t wrong,” he said. “So, here’s how this is going to work. I will tell Clint that you want to talk to him.”

“So, you do know him.”

“Yes,” Agent Coulson said. “I’ll tell him that you want to talk to him, _but_ whether or not he contacts you is up to him. If he decides he doesn’t want to talk to you—and I have to tell you, there’s a decent chance he won’t—that’s the end of it. It’s his call. You’ll respect it and you won’t talk to any reporters. Do we have a deal?”

It was funny. Barney had been trying to track Clint down for so long, and now he felt like he was inches away. It was almost harder than being in limbo because now he’d find out just how completely he’d managed to fuck up his relationship with his little brother. 

He had to steel himself slightly, but Barney nodded in agreement. “We have a deal.”

“Good.” Agent Coulson put his sunglasses back on. “We’ll be in touch.”

“ _Is_ he okay?” Barney asked before he could turn away.

Agent Coulson hesitated for just a moment. “Yeah. He’s okay. He’s good, actually.”

Barney nodded. “Tell him I’m sorry for walking out the way I did,” he said. “In case I don’t get to tell him myself.”

He couldn’t say if Agent Coulson would pass along his message. Secret agents must take classes on how to keep a poker face. Barney watched as Agent Coulson got back in his car and drove away. He told himself not to get his hopes up too high.

Barney got in his truck and headed home to his family.

*****

_The Next Day_  
 _SHIELD Headquarters_  
 _Coulson’s Office_

“Morning, Phil. You wanted to see me?” Clint asked, leaning around the doorframe of Phil’s office.

Something was up. Phil was supposed to have been home yesterday afternoon. Clint and River knew he’d had a rough weekend, and they’d planned to take him out for dinner at that new Japanese place out near the mall. Instead Phil had called from the train to say that something had come up that he needed to take care of. He was taking a quick side trip and would probably be getting in late. 

He hadn’t been forthcoming about where he needed to go or what he needed to do. Clint wasn’t sure when exactly Phil had returned to base, but he had woken up this morning to a message asking him to swing by Phil’s office.

It must be something at least quasi-official. If it weren’t, Phil would have just come by their quarters or suggested meeting up for breakfast. 

“Hey, Clint.” Phil looked like he was dead on his feet and he’d broken out his extra-large VMI coffee mug this morning. He waved Clint into his office. “Come on in. Shut the door.”

Clint did as he was told and flopped down in his usual chair. “Whatever it is, Rogers put me up to it.”

“You’re not in trouble.” Phil reached for his coffee. “I need to talk to you about where I went yesterday.”

“Yeah, where _did_ you go yesterday?” Clint said. “The world can’t have been ending. River and I get calls when that happens now.”

“No, the world wasn’t ending.” And yet, Phil looked like he was psyching himself up for something. “I went to Indiana to talk to your brother.”

For a moment Clint felt like he was in a rapidly climbing quinjet; his stomach dropped and pressure built in his ears until it felt like his hearing aids had gone on the fritz. He pushed himself up straighter in his chair and the sensation went away. “You what?”

“He’s been calling SHIELD ever since the Battle of New York. I just found out yesterday.” Phil looked apologetic. “He saw you on the news.”

“I thought SHIELD killed that footage.” 

“They killed as much as they could, as fast as they could,” Phil said. “But Barney saw a shot of a guy with a bow who goes by _Hawkeye._ That was all he needed.”

Clint got up, suddenly too restless to sit. He paced the width of the office twice. “What does he want?”

“He wants to talk to you.”

“He wants to. . .?” Clint laughed. “Well, that’s a switch.”

In the months leading up to Barney’s vanishing act back at Carson’s, Barney had barely talked to Clint at all unless it was to put him down or blow up at him about something. Mostly it had just been radio silence. And the morning Barney had taken off for good, leaving the circus to join up with some two-bit criminal crew, he’d done it without a word. 

Clint had told Phil about it once. Only once. _I got up that morning and his shit was gone. One of the roustabouts said they saw him get picked up by a car an hour before dawn. He didn’t leave a note, didn’t say a word. No “good-bye.” No “I’m out of here.” No “fuck you, I never want to see you again.” Nothing._

His brother hadn’t even cared enough to tell him he was leaving. As rocky as things had been between them there at the end, his departure had left Clint feeling lost. That feeling hadn’t really gone away until Phil had brought him to SHIELD.

“What the hell does he want to talk about?” Clint said, rounding on Phil.

“I don’t know exactly, kid,” Phil replied. “From talking to him, it sounds like he regrets what he did and wants to reestablish communication with you. I told him I’d pass the message along, but the decision was in your hands. I’ll back you, whatever you decide you want to do.”

Clint opened his mouth to say _I don’t want to talk to him,_ but the words wouldn’t come out. “Is he in prison?” he asked instead.

“Not currently,” Phil replied. He opened his desk drawer and pulled out a thick file. “I’ve been keeping this for you in case you ever asked for it. I think you should take it now. It’s everything I have on your brother, everything he’s been up to for the last fifteen years. Why don’t you read it and then decide?”

Clint eyed the file. His mouth had gone oddly dry. “Yeah.”

“And Clint? There’s no deadline on this,” Phil said. “Take all the time you need. I’m always available to talk, okay?”

Clint just nodded as he gingerly picked up the file. “Thanks, Phil. I’ll let you know.”

*****

River had parted ways with Clint after morning training.

Clint had a mystery meeting with Phil, so River filled her morning in the gym. Agent May, newly transferred from the Los Angeles base, was putting the new class of SHIELD recruits through their paces on the sparring mats. There was some talent in the class though, as usual, a few of the more zealous fighters had a lot of bad habits they’d need to have trained out of them. Afterward, River and May met Hill in the mess hall for lunch where May gave them the rundown about an underground hacker group that was starting to cause havoc in the Los Angeles area. 

River had checked her phone few times to see if there were any messages from Clint, any indication of what his meeting with Phil was about, but there was nothing. She didn’t see him in the mess hall, either. Curious, but not a reason for general concern. 

She _was_ slightly concerned when she entered their quarters and found Clint lying on the sofa staring at the ceiling. Clint was a very active sort of person, on the go most of the day. The last time River had found him lounging on the sofa in the middle of the day, twelve hours later he’d been booked into the infirmary with a monstrous case of strep throat. River frowned down at him worriedly. He didn’t look so good.

“Clint? Are you okay?”

Clint looked up at her with a wry but genuine smile. “Don’t worry. I’m not dying,” he said. “Just had some thinking to do.”

River raised an inquiring eyebrow at him. Clint sighed and sat up. He caught River’s hand and pulled her down next to him. He didn’t say anything for several long moments, but River waited patiently. Whatever was the matter, she knew he was finding the right angle to approach it from.

“Barney’s back.”

A second alien invasion would have caught River less off guard. “Pardon?”

She listened as Clint recounted his meeting with Phil, keeping a tight rein on the protective indignation she could feel rising up. Barney Barton had to come crawling out of the woodwork _now_? Clint had already been through a lot this year. Now this?

“Phil gave me Barney’s file,” Clint said. He reached under the throw pillow he’d been lying on and pulled out the object in question. By the look of it, Phil had been keeping it for long time. “Everything Barney’s done since the last time I saw him.”

“So, what does it say?”

“I don’t know.” Clint almost sounded sheepish. “I haven’t read it. I know I should, it’s just. . .I mean look at the size of this thing.”

River nodded in understanding. The idea of going from no information on Barney to a decade-and-a-half’s worth had to be incredibly overwhelming.

“How about this?” she offered after a moment of thought. “I’ll read it and give you a run down of the main points. Then you can go back and read at your leisure for the details. Would that help?”

“Yeah. I think it would.” Yet Clint didn’t look entirely convinced. “I feel kind of bad, though. Drawing you into my family shit.”

“Hey.” River smiled and nudged him with her elbow. “We are partners, Clint, in every conceivable sense of the word. Your family shit is my family shit, and vice versa. You’re the one who went to Demons Run, remember?”

Clint laughed. “Well. When you put it like that. . .” He held the file out to her. “Okay, partner. Tell me what it says.”

*****

River insisted on making tea before cracking open the file. Clint watched her bustle around the kitchen, filling the kettle and preparing two mugs. The sight made him feel a little more centered. She carried the mugs into the living room, setting Clint’s on the coffee table. Clint had stretched out on the sofa again, and River waved him back when he went to sit up. She settled in at the other end of the sofa with Clint’s legs across her lap, using his shins as an improvised desk. She took a sip of her tea and opened the file.

Clint had no qualms about letting River read Barney’s file. She already knew everything about Barney that Clint himself knew. Clint watched her as she skimmed through the pages, trying not to read too much into her facial expressions, a slight purse of the lips here, a quirked eyebrow there. She idly fiddled with a loose tendril of hair at her temple, the way she did when she was laser-focused on what she was reading.

“All right,” she said after several minutes, flipping back to the first page of the file. “Charles Bernard _Barney_ Barton, age thirty-six. It looks like Phil managed to get his hands on a recent photo.” River pulled it out from under the paperclip and studied it. “You two really do have the same eyes.”

“Yeah. About the only thing we wound up having in common,” Clint said. 

“Do you want to see?”

Clint only hesitated for a second. “Yeah. Sure.”

The last time Clint had seen his brother, Barney had been twenty-one. In Clint’s mind he’d never really gotten any older. The picture that River handed to him could almost have been of a different man. The Barney that Clint remembered had had a lean, sharp face and hard eyes, and his mouth had often been twisted in a way that made him look like he was going to start a fight at any given moment. 

This man? Well, he was clearly still Barney, but fifteen years made a hell of a difference. He’d filled out some and his hair, several shades darker than Clint’s, was liberally threaded with grey. The biggest difference, though? Barney was smiling. Really smiling, eyes and all. He was at some sort of outdoor function and he looked happy and relaxed. 

_Jesus, he looks just like Dad,_ Clint realized with a start. Gerald Barton had been a warm, cheerful man. He’d worked construction and had always smelled a little like sweat, freshly-cut wood, and paint. Clint’s dad had been Barney’s age when he’d died. Clint shook his head against the landslide of memories. 

River was eyeing him, but thankfully didn’t comment.

“The crew he fell in with. You said it was run by a guy named Tom Garner?” she asked.

Clint tore his eyes away from the photo. “Yeah. I’m pretty sure that was it.”

“It looks like Barney worked for him for a couple of years,” River said. “The crew was tied to a few dozen jobs all over the Midwest. Low-level stuff mostly; petty fraud, burglary, car theft, strong-arm-for-hire stuff. Then it looks like Garner got more ambitious. He branched out into gun-running and bank robbery. They targeted a bank in Fort Wayne in January 1999. Shit went sideways mid-job and Barney and two other members of the crew were arrested. Barney was sentenced to five years in prison.”

Clint grunted. _That_ sounded more like the Barney he remembered.

“Where,” River continued, flipping to the next page, “it seems he became the poster child for rehabilitation. He got off to a bit of a rocky start, but on the whole, prison straightened him out. He got his GED. He took trade classes and qualified as an electrician. He got out in 2004. His parole officer found him a job with a small company called Yastrzemski & Sons in Hartnell, Indiana, about an hour outside of Indianapolis. He’s been there for the last eight years and is apparently a model employee.”

She was silent for several beats, until Clint took his eyes off the ceiling and looked at her quizzically. River was watching him. “Are you good?” she asked.

“Yeah. Fine. Processing.” Clint scooted upright a little and reached for his mug of tea. “Keep going.”

“Okay. He settled down in Hartnell. In late 2005 he started dating Lisa DeCosta. She’s a life-long Hartnell resident, a CPA, and an active member of Trinity Presbyterian Church. She has two daughters from a previous marriage, Madeline and Zoe; they’re now thirteen and ten, respectively. Barney and Lisa got married in 2008. They have a son, Caleb, who was born in February of this year.”

Clint drank his tea without comment, glad that River had brewed it strong with a lot of sugar. Jesus, Barney had kids? That was hard to picture.

River turned to a new section of the file. This time when she glanced at Clint she looked almost apologetic. 

“He tried to find you,” she said.

Cint lowered his mug. “What?”

“Not long after he got settled in Hartnell,” River said. “He started by trying to track down people from Carson’s Carnival, but it had gone out of business by that time and everyone had scattered. Later he hired a private detective, Ben Willis out of Indianapolis. Not exactly top shelf, but competent. He managed to trace you as far as the Army. There, of course, he hit a dead end.”

“Yeah,” Clint said. SHIELD had made sure of that. People like Clint and River (even Phil, to an extent) existed in a strange little sphere. They lived in the shadows, alongside the world rather than as a part of it. 

Barney? He had managed to become a part of the world. 

“That’s the general overview,” River said. “The rest is a lot of detail.” 

River closed the file and picked up her mug of tea, sipping it silently. Clint knew that she was waiting for him to respond. He also knew that River was patient and would wait for hours without pushing him on this if that was what he needed.

“I guess,” Clint said, breaking several minutes of silence, “I always thought that if I ever saw Barney again it would be with him behind bars. Or in a morgue.”

Ten years ago, he _would_ have seen Barney in prison according to Phil’s file. It had never occurred to Clint that Barney might have changed so much. Clint wasn’t sure how he felt about that. In a way, the prison scenario would have been easier. He had been prepared for it. He would have had a better handle on how to react to it. 

“Me too,” River confessed. “Mind you, I’m glad that’s not the case.”

Clint knew that the reason she was glad was because the prison or morgue scenarios would have been hard on him. Much like Clint harbored very little love for Robert and Elizabeth MacDonald, River’s Silence-appointed foster family, River held a second-degree grudge against Barney for the things he’d done to Clint. Clint’s feelings about Barney were complicated. River’s didn’t have to be.

Complicated. That kind of summed up this whole mess, didn’t it?

“On the other hand, I never really imagined Barney _wanting_ to talk to me again,” Clint said. He blew out a long, deep breath. “What would you do if you were me?”

River silently contemplated her mug of tea for several moments. Clint felt a little guilty for even asking her that, given the current state of things between her and Amy and Rory. Amy and Rory were still coming to terms with the fact that River was their daughter, and had taken a step back to deal. River hadn’t heard much from them since Demons Run except for a few texts and emails from Rory. She didn’t say much about it, but Clint knew how badly she wished that her parents would talk to her. Now here was Clint trying to decide whether to shut out a brother who wanted to talk to him.

“I think,” she said at last, “that I wouldn’t make a decision about it right now. In fact, I wouldn’t make a decision for a few days at least. Phil said you could take all the time you need, right?”

“That’s what he said.” Phil knew very well that Clint hated being backed into a corner. “Okay, step one, no hasty decisions. Then what?”

River sighed and set her mug and Barney’s file aside. Then she shifted, stretching out on top of Clint with her head resting on his shoulder. “Then, I suppose you’ll have to decide what you’d regret more: letting him in, or keeping him at a distance.” She wrapped her arm around Clint’s chest. “I’ll have your back no matter what you decide.”

“Thanks.” Clint folded his arms around her. He still had no idea what to do, but he did feel better.

*****

Phil kept a watchful eye on Clint over the next week.

There was little outward change in Clint’s demeanor, except that maybe he was quieter than usual. He trained with his usual focus. He taught new recruits. He attended the Avengers’ weekly briefing and actually participated. He went out with the local animal rescue organization to help get a dog and her litter of puppies out of a collapsing warehouse. The Assisi Society habitually called on their SHIELD volunteers to help with the more precarious rescues, and Clint was always first in line to offer his services.

“Is Barton okay?” Rogers asked Phil at one point.

“Why do you ask?” Phil replied.

“I don’t know.” Steve shrugged, frowning. “He just seems a little preoccupied, I guess?”

“We all just have a lot going on right now,” Phil said. “There’s nothing to worry about.”

Thankfully, Rogers didn’t press. Phil knew that Cap’s heart was in the right place, but this was not a situation that Clint would want his new teammates poking at.

Clint didn’t take Phil up on his invitation to come talk to him about Barney, but he _was_ talking to River. He knew, because River told him. _I know how you worry, so just know that he’s not bottling it up._ That was good and as it should be as far as Phil was concerned, and it did make him worry less. As long as Clint was talking to someone.

So, Phil didn’t crowd him. He didn’t bring up the subject of Barney with Clint. He knew that when Clint had made his decision about Barney, he’d come to Phil. 

“Which way do you think he’ll go?” Valerie asked.

“Honestly? I have no idea,” Phil replied. It was kind of novel. He couldn’t really remember a time when he wasn’t able to work out what was going on in Clint’s head. “On one hand, Clint’s never expressed a wish to contact his brother. On the other hand. . .”

“On the other hand, his brother is the last connection he has to his childhood.” Valerie reached out of frame and picked up her coffee mug. She was sitting in her kitchen, her laptop set up on the breakfast bar. “Do you think Clint should? Let him back in, I mean?”

“I’m not sure about that either. It might be better if he didn’t.” 

“And why is that?” Phil knew that tone. That was Valerie’s _talk it through with me, Coulson_ tone.

Phil leaned back in his chair, picking up his own cup of coffee. He was in his quarters, his computer on the small table. It was early, the perfect time to sneak in a Skype call with Valerie before she left for work. They’d gotten into the habit of doing this a few mornings a week since the summer. 

“Because with all the shit Clint has been through in his life—losing his parents, the crappy foster homes, military prison—I don’t think anything hit him as hard as Barney walking out on him did. I don’t think Barney has any bad intentions now, but what if he takes a look at Clint’s life and decides it’s more than he wants to deal with? What if Clint meets him halfway only to get rejected again?”

Phil wasn’t sure Clint could handle that. Between being brainjacked by Loki, the Battle of New York, becoming an Avenger, and Demons Run, Clint had already had a hell of a year.

“Well, in that case you could just have Barney audited,” Valerie said dryly.

Phil made a face at her over the rim of his coffee mug. “I only do that to Irene.”

Valerie had been blessed with an awesome step-mother, but her mother-mother, Irene, was a piece of work. Whenever Irene’s batshittery hit a certain level (every eighteen months or so), Phil made a call to a contact at the IRS and unleased a little red-tape hell. Was it petty? Yes. Still, given that Phil had to ability to have people snuffed, he figured that an audit was a pretty benign method of revenge.

“You know, Phil,” Valerie was smiling fondly at him through the computer screen, “sometimes I think you still see Clint as that scared nineteen-year-old kid you recruited. He’s a big boy. He’s saved the world. He’s getting married. He has River and you and SHIELD and the Avengers.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning he has support now that he didn’t have the first time Barney walked away from him.”

“Is this your way of telling me I’m being a worrywart?” Phil asked.

“You _are_ a worrywart,” Valerie replied. “But that’s one of the things I love about you.”

“Speaking of worrying about people, how are you doing?” Phil asked.

Valerie sighed. “The house is too quiet. And I miss having a pile of squeaky toys on the bathmat when I get out of the shower.”

“You can always start looking at dog rescues,” Phil said. 

“No. It’s way too soon,” Valerie said. “Maybe in a year.”

Phil would bet on more like three or four months, but he didn’t say that. Valerie was the sort of person who just wasn’t happy without a dog. She’d ultimately honor Jackson’s memory by giving another dog a good home.

After his call with Valerie, Phil had a morning meeting with Fury that wound up being an all-day marathon comprised of a series of video conferences with the World Security Council, Secretary of Defense Alexander Pierce, and General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross.

General Ross was starting to make some choppy waves in high places over the Avengers in general and Banner in particular. Ross had made it his life’s mission to hunt Bruce Banner down and take him into the custody of the US Army. He’d been at it for years. He was not happy that Banner was now officially contracted to an agency sponsored by the United Nations, and therefore out of his reach.

“And is SHIELD going to take responsibility when the Hulk demolishes another borough of New York?” Ross demanded during hour five of the meetings. “Because I see it as inevitable. As I understand it, he’s living in Stark Tower, meaning you’re allowing a ticking time bomb to roam loose in the middle of Manhattan.” 

Personally, Phil suspected that Ross was nursing a grudge against Banner for eluding him for so long. Banner had made him look like a fool more than once during his years on the run.

Ross also dropped some broad and not-so-subtle hints that he considered the Avengers themselves a disaster waiting to happen. He stopped short of saying it outright, but he clearly thought that the Avengers should fall under the authority of the United States Military. The World Security Council wasn’t going for it, and thankfully Pierce, as the US representative, shut it down hard. Still, Phil wasn’t entirely set at ease.

“Ross is going to be a problem,” Phil said to Fury when they were finally able to sign off.

“Probably. But for right now he’s a problem for another day. Pierce will stay on top of it. He can keep Ross in check if anyone can.” Fury rubbed the back of his neck tiredly. “Speaking of current problems, how’s Barton’s brother situation?”

Phil hadn’t mentioned Barney Barton to Fury. Not because he was trying to hide it, but because Fury had more important matters to concern himself with. It didn’t surprise him that Fury had somehow gotten wind of it, though. The man knew everything that went down at Headquarters.

“Still in a holding pattern, sir. Barney Barton is keeping up his end. He’s backed off and is keeping a low profile. Now it’s up to Clint.”

And it was probably time to actively check in on his agent on that matter. Phil swung through the mess hall long enough to bolt down a very late lunch (it was already three o’clock in the afternoon). Then he headed over to the ranges, where Clint and River usually were by this point in the day. 

They weren’t there, but the range safety officer was able to point Phil toward the outdoor training courses. Phil followed the running path down the hill to the wide-open area of fields and woods. He spotted Clint and River on the top platform of the central tower of the ropes course. Phil sighed, shucked off his suit jacket and draped it over a rail, and started up the ladder.

By the time he reached the platform, Clint and River were watching to top of the ladder expectantly. Of course, from their vantage point, they would have seen him coming. They were sitting cross-legged on the platform with a thermos between them, for all the world like a pair of kids in a treehouse. They were both bundled in fleece jackets against the brisk breeze that was blowing up here. Phil kind of regretted leaving his jacket down below.

“Hey, Phil,” River said.

“Hey. What are you guys doing up here?” Phil asked.

“Hiding from our collective family issues,” Clint said. “Want to join?”

“Sure.” Phil settled down with them. Clint passed him the thermos, which turned out to contain coffee. Phil took a ceremonial swig and then passed it on to River. “So, how are things on that front?” he asked her. “Any new developments?”

“I had an email from Amy this morning,” River said. “She’s doing okay. She’s picked up a job doing freelance writing for a couple of local magazines. She seems to like it. She said to tell you hi.”

“That’s great,” Phil said. He knew that Rory had been in touch with River, but this was the first time that Amy had reached out to her daughter directly. Phil mentally took a deep breath and turned to Clint. “How about you? Have you made up your mind about Barney?”

Clint took the thermos back from River and took a drink before replying. “We’ve been talking about it,” he said, “and. . .I think I want to talk to him.”

“You think?”

“I want to talk to him,” Clint said, sounding more certain. He looked at Phil with a wry smile, but a determined look in his eyes. “At least once. I’ll hear what he has to say. I figure if I don’t give him that, I’m no better than he was, right?”

“Okay.” Phil wasn’t sure if it was the healthiest motivation, but okay. “I’ll call the Indianapolis office to help with coordination. We’ll set up a phone call and--”

“No,” Clint said. In a blink that determination hardened into steel. “Not by phone. I want to talk to him in person.”

Phil quickly shut down the part of his brain that wanted to sound red alert sirens. “Are you sure about that?”

Clint nodded. “Yeah. You can’t read people for shit over a phone. If I’m going to do this, I want to do it face to face.”

Phil glanced at River who just nodded. That meant that Clint’s mind was made up.

“All right. In person it is,” Phil said. “When do you want to do this?”

“Soon,” Clint replied.

“I’ll call Indianapolis. We’ll find a good neutral spot and set up a meet.”

*****

_Five Days Later_  
 _On the outskirts of Indianapolis_

Clint didn’t get Cracker Barrel. The place looked like Laura Ingalls Wilder had decorated it while on a bender. He got why the Indianapolis office had picked it for the meet, but. . .Jesus. There was a fucking plow hanging from the ceiling, for Christ’s sake.

“More coffee for you, hon?”

Clint pulled his eyes off the plow and focused on Shirley, the grandmotherly waitress who was on her fifth pass by his table. The restaurant was between the breakfast and lunch rushes, so there weren’t a whole lot of customers to keep the waitstaff busy.

“Yeah. Please,” Clint said. 

Shirley refilled his mug, cast a slightly concerned look at the untouched plate of pancakes in front of him, and headed back to the kitchen. He could have told her it wasn’t personal; he hadn’t done much more than pick at his food for the last couple of days. Clint looked over at the table by the far window where Phil and River, dressed in civvies, were sitting. River gave him an encouraging smile. It was almost time. 

Clint had thought he’d feel more nervous. Okay, yeah, if he actually tried to eat those pancakes he’d probably hurl, but on the whole he felt calm. It was like being on a mission. Once the clock had started the only thing that mattered was securing the objective and getting everyone out alive. On the plus side, there was unlikely to be any actual gunfire.

Movement at the hostess station drew his eyes and Clint suddenly sat up a little straighter. There was a dark-haired woman there with two girls who could have been her younger clones. Clint recognized her from pictures in Phil’s file; Lisa, Barney’s wife. And those were her daughters. Barney’s step-daughters, Maddie and Zoe. _Nieces? Shit, that makes them my nieces, doesn’t it?_ Then as they started to follow the hostess into the dining room, Clint saw Barney.

He was at the back of the group, carrying the baby. _Caleb,_ Clint reminded himself. Barney caught sight of Clint at the same moment and stopped in his tracks for a second. Then he collected himself and followed his family to a table along the wall, across the room from Phil and River. It took them a few minutes to get settled, shedding coats and wrangling a high chair into place. Maddie and Zoe stared at Clint with unabashed curiosity until a stern, “Girls,’ from their mother turned their eyes back to their own table.

Once everyone was settled Barney took a visibly deep breath and walked over to Clint’s table. Clint found himself looking his brother in the eye for the first time in fifteen years. 

“Hey, Clint. Can I sit down?”

*****

Barney wondered what kind of spy agency set up a meeting in a Cracker Barrel. That was a weird choice, wasn’t it? Or maybe it wasn’t. Barney had no idea how spy meetings were supposed to work. When he’d gotten the call that Clint had agreed to talk to him and wanted to do it face-to-face, he’d half expected the meeting to be in some creepy basement room with black walls and a naked lightbulb hanging from the ceiling.

Given that possible option, Barney wasn’t going to complain about a Cracker Barrel, especially since it meant that Lisa and the kids could be here.

He spotted Clint the moment he stepped into the dining room. Barney hadn’t been expecting that, but Clint wasn’t exactly hiding. He was sitting at a table right in the middle of the room, facing the entrance. He had his eyes locked on Barney, and Barney had forgotten how serious Clint looked when he was concentrating on something (an expression at odds with the happy-go-lucky personality Clint had had, at least as when he was younger). Barney could feel Clint watching him the whole time he and Lisa were getting the family situated at their table.

Clint hadn’t come alone either. Agent Coulson was sitting at a table over by the window, and man did he just look _wrong_ when he wasn’t wearing a suit. There was a young woman sitting at the table with Coulson, petite, pretty, with golden-brown hair clipped back into a ponytail. She was watching Barney too, and she reminded Barney uncomfortably of the tiger they’d had back at Carson’s Carnival. The lion had been fairly laid back, but you never wanted to turn your back on that tiger. 

Barney tried to tune them out as he and Lisa got the kids at least somewhat distracted with their menus. Caleb, of course, had no idea what was going on, but Barney and Lisa had explained things to Maddie and Zoe. The fact that their stepdad had finally found his brother was exciting enough, but to have that brother turn out to be one of the Heroes of New York? Well, no wonder they kept staring.

Lisa looked at Barney with an encouraging smile and mouthed, _Go on._

In the short walk to Clint’s table, Barney tried to take in everything he could, trying to get a feel for how this was going to go. It was kind of a shock to realize that Clint wasn’t a skinny teenager anymore. Yeah, he was definitely still Barney’s kid brother, but there were some lines in his face now, the kind that came more from a lot of time outdoors than from age. There was a quiet weight about him that Barney didn’t remember from before, and something about Clint’s eyes almost made the hair on the back of Barney’s neck stand up.

It was interesting how things just snapped into place sometimes. Barney had spotted Clint in the news coverage, shooting down alien soldiers with his bow and arrow. He knew from the private eye he’d hired to track Clint down that Clint had joined the Army and had been fast-tracked into a sniper unit. He’d spent a lot of time reading up on SHIELD and their role in world affairs. For the first time it hit home to Barney what Clint’s job must involve. 

_Jesus Christ, you’ve killed people, haven’t you?_ Following closely on the heels of that was, _Get a grip, Barton. This is your brother._

“Hey, Clint,” Barney said, hoping that he sounded halfway normal. “Can I sit down?”

A humorless smile tugged at Clint’s mouth, and Barney felt a small pang of guilt. He used to see that expression in the mirror all the time. 

“That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?” Clint said.

Barney decided that that counted as permission. He pulled out the chair opposite Clint and sat down. A waitress descended immediately and Barney ordered a cup of coffee just to have something to do with his hands. 

“Phil said you wanted to talk,” Clint said after the waitress had brought Barney’s coffee and refilled Clint’s mug. 

“That’s right,” Barney replied, his eyes straying again to the table by the window where Agent Coulson and the mystery woman sat. First name basis. Okay.

“So. Talk,” Clint said.

This reunion could be going better. On the other hand, Barney reflected, it could probably be going worse. “How have you been?” he asked.

A funny look crossed Clint’s face. It was less _It’s good to see you, brother,_ and much more, _Are you fucking kidding me?_ “Fine,” he said, drawling the word out a bit. He glanced over at Lisa’s table. “I heard you’ve been busy. Wife. Kids. The whole family bit.”

“Yeah.” Barney looked over, too. Maddie and Zoe had found one of those peg games and were playing it. Lisa was fishing through the diaper bag while Caleb chewed on a set of bright plastic keys. “Do you. . .I don’t know. Want to come over and meet them?”

It was almost like Clint didn’t hear the question. “It’s funny. I seem to remember you not having time for stupid shit like family.” He turned his eyes back to Barney. “At least that was the impression I got when you took off.”

Barney felt his hopes sink a little bit. On the other hand, he’d been braced for this. He’d been rehearsing what he was going to say for, well, years.

“I shouldn’t have run out on you like that,” Barney said. “I’m sorry. Back then all I could think about was getting out, starting a life of my own. So I told myself that you’d be fine and I just went.”

“I’d be fine? I was barely seventeen and you were the only family I had left.” Clint clammed up as the waitress passed by. When he spoke again he’d lowered his voice. “And let’s face it, you checked out a long time before you fell in with Garner and his crew.”

“I’m sorry for that, too.” Barney wasn’t about to deny it. One of his counselors in prison had been big on the whole _accountability_ thing. “I was a pretty shitty big brother.”

“Yeah, you can say that again.”

The thing about making amends, Barney had been taught, was that the person being apologized to was never under any obligation to grant forgiveness. Unfortunately, Barney was beginning to think that it wasn’t go to matter how much he apologized. 

“Is that why you agreed to this meeting?” Barney asked. “So that you could tell me to my face exactly how much you hate me?”

Clint didn’t answer.

“Let me ask you something,” Barney said. “How long have your friends with SHIELD known exactly where and how to find me?”

“Honestly? They probably tracked you down the same week they recruited me.” Barney must have had a questioning look on his face because Clint huffed a little impatiently. “Nineteen. They recruited me when I was nineteen.”

“Okay. So, you had years where you could have contacted me, but you didn’t. If me being your only family was so important, why didn’t you?”

“Because I was pissed at you and didn’t want to talk to you.” Clint glared at him. “But I never hated you.”

*****

Clint hadn’t known it for sure until he said it out loud, but it was true. He didn’t hate Barney.

Barney looked a little wary. “Are you sure about that? Because you kind of look like you’re about to gut me with your butter knife.”

Clint snorted. “That’s just how my face looks.” 

“No, _that_ face I remember. This face definitely wants to stab someone.”

Clint stared Barney down for several seconds before breaking eye contact to scratch his nose. It didn’t actually itch, but Clint could feel his lips twitching, trying to smile, goddammit. He didn’t want Barney to see that.

“I don’t hate you,” Clint repeated when he had his face back under control. “I’m not sure how much I like you anymore, but I don’t hate you.”

“Well, that’s something,” Barney said. “So.”

“So.” Clint caught himself fidgeting with a sugar packet and deliberately dropped it back into the dish with its friends. “Anyway, I’ve been fine. Thanks for asking.”

“Fine. . .being a secret agent?” Barney asked.

“More or less.” No point in trying to talk around it. Barney had clearly done his homework on SHIELD. Thanks to the media coverage since the Battle, the general public now had a pretty good idea of what SHIELD’s function was. 

“And you fight aliens.”

“That part’s pretty new,” Clint said.

Barney shook his head. “You know, after the trail on you went cold. . .I spent a lot of time worrying that you were dead.”

“Not dead,” Clint said.

“I’m glad.”

“Yeah. I’m glad you’re not dead, too.”

They weren’t dead and they didn’t hate each other. Clint wasn’t sure where that ranked them on the family disfunction scale, but it probably wasn’t last place.

“So, what have you been doing besides work for SHIELD?” Barney asked. “Are you married?”

Clint looked over toward River, relieved to see that she had relaxed a little bit. River had been going into hyper-overly-protective mode on their way to the restaurant this morning. 

“Not yet. We’re planning on it though,” Clint said. “Got engaged back in January.”

Barney followed his gaze with an _Ah ha!_ look on his face. “That’s great. Congratulations.” A thought seemed to occur to him and he leaned across the table toward Clint, lowering his voice. “That’s the woman you were on the news with, isn’t it? She’s the one from the Battle? Talon?”

“River. And yeah, that’s her. We’re partners.”

*****

Phil could tell that this was killing River.

Most of the time when they were in the field, River was the one who did the close-up work. She was the one who walked into dangerous situations, rubbing shoulders with some of the most evil specimens of humanity imaginable. Clint was the one who watched from a distance, alerting her to danger, guiding her to safety, and providing cover fire. Their skill sets had complimented each other from the beginning, and over time that had contributed to them being one of the most successful teams in SHIELD’s history.

River herself wasn’t so good at sitting back and watching when Clint was the one in danger. No, this wasn’t a mission. Clint’s life wasn’t in peril. But Demons Run was still pretty raw for River, so this long lost family reunion had her on edge.

Phil gently nudged her shin under the table with the toe of his shoe. River pulled her attention away from Clint and Barney and gave him a sharp look.

“Take it easy,” Phil said quietly, the words covered by the rim of his coffee mug. “He’s okay.”

River sighed, going back to pretending to eat her scrambled eggs. They were stone cold and she had pushed them from one end of her plate to the other three times now. “I hate this,” she said.

“I know you do.” Phil smiled sympathetically. Of course, he was in the same boat she was: they both wanted nothing more than to keep Clint from harm, but at this point there was little they could do to intervene. 

For a few minutes it looked like the reunion between Clint and his brother was going to be short and not a little bit explosive. But then something shifted, and the tension eased a few degrees. Phil couldn’t really hear what they were saying, much as he wanted to. Clint and Barney were keeping their voices low and, even though the restaurant wasn’t crowded, there was too much background noise to eavesdrop. 

At one point, Clint and Barney both looked directly over at Phil and River’s table. Barney cautiously smiled at River and raised one hand in a half wave. River frowned, but nodded politely back. Phil got the distinct impression that Barney had just been introduced to his new sister-in-law. 

Clint and Barney didn’t talk for long, only about twenty minutes. Then Clint came over to join Phil and River while Barney retreated back to his family’s table. Clint slid into the chair next to River and let out a sigh that made him sound like he’d been holding his breath for the last hour. 

Which, Phil reflected, probably wasn’t an inaccurate assessment.

“How did it go?” River asked.

“Email,” Clint said. He must have caught sight of River’s and Phil’s perplexed looks, because he elaborated, “We figure we’ll stick to email for a while to see how this plays out. I mean, we don’t really know each other anymore. You know?” 

“I think that’s a good place to start,” Phil said.

“Yeah.” Clint ran a hand over his face. “Jesus, is this what a blind date feels like?”

“I’m afraid I wouldn’t know,” River said.

“There are some parallels.” Phil raised an eyebrow at their looks. “What? I’ve had a life. So, if emailing goes okay, then what?”

“Fuck if I know.”

“We’ll figure it out when we get there,” River said. 

Clint nodded. “One more thing. . .”

*****

The two family camps formally met on the restaurant’s front porch as the lunch rush started to roll in.

Clint had wavered on doing this, and on asking Phil and River to do it with him. But Barney really wanted Clint to meet his family, and meeting him halfway felt like the right thing to do. God knew if it actually was the right thing; it wasn’t like there was a SHIELD procedure for this. It felt right though, and Clint figured that would have to be good enough for the moment. Hell, it was worth it just to see Barney’s stepdaughters shake hands with River. They had been curious about Clint, but they looked kind of overawed to be meeting “the girl Avenger.”

“Hey, you know,” Clint said to Barney before they parted ways, “when you left, you didn’t take any of the old pictures with you.”

The Barton brothers hadn’t had much left from their life with their parents, but they had managed to hang onto a few dozen old family snapshots. Barney hadn’t taken a single one with him when he’d taken off with Garner’s gang. Clint had assumed it was just one more way of writing off his past.

“No,” Barney replied. He looked a little uncomfortable. “I didn’t.”

“I have them all scanned into the computer. I’ll send them to you.”

“I’d like that. Thanks.”

Clint sprawled in the backseat of the SUV on the drive back to the airfield. “I feel like this is becoming a trend,” he said.

He saw Phil, who was driving, glance into the rearview mirror at him. “What’s becoming a trend?”

“Family. Reunions and stuff.” Clint shifted a little, trying to get away from the seat belt buckle that was gouging him in the back. “First it was you and Valerie. Then River came out to Amy and Rory.” River, who was riding shotgun, looked around the seat at him. “Now, Barney. I mean. . .” Clint gave up on sprawling and sat up. “Do you think this is just going to keep happening? Do you think we’ll find out that Fury has a twin brother, or Tony has a dozen illegitimate kids?”

“Tony’s too smart to have a dozen illegitimate kids,” River said.

“And if Fury’s hiding a twin brother, none of us will ever know unless he wants us to know,” Phil added. “That would be up there with finding out that Director Downing has been secretly married all her life.”

“I guess.”

“I think you’re doing the right thing, for the record,” River said. “Trying to rebuild a relationship with Barney.”

“Thanks,” Clint said. 

He felt like he was flying by the seat of his pants, so it helped to know that River and Phil didn’t think he was being an idiot for accepting Barney’s olive branch. And he knew that if things should start to go off the rails, River and Phil would catch him. They wouldn’t let him get lost. That was what family did. What _their_ family did, anyway.

“Hey, we’re not on a tight time-table, are we?” he asked. “Can we make a stop?”

“Sure,” Phil replied. “For what?”

“Lunch. I’m starving all of a sudden.”

River started laughing and Phil grinned and shook his head. “Well, his appetite is back. That’s a good sign.”

Clint just grinned and settled in a bit more comfortably.


End file.
